THE APE OF NAPLES

This final Coil album (aside from posthumous remixes and compilations and the like), its terminal nature dictated by the death of John Balance, finds the maverick industrial pioneers in a contemplative and melancholy mood. Sure, Coil have set plenty of morbid precedent with their earlier albums, but here the industrial spikiness of prior releases has here given way to a glum electronic dark ambient mood of nostalgia and regret, with extra spice added by the inclusion of a few folky elements (without taking a hard right turn into neofolk). It's not a perfect swansong - indeed, some pieces feel more like unfinished sketches or aimless noodling - and we'll never know how it would have turned out had Balance lived to see its release, but it's far from an embarrassment.